Artist in Confusion: True Image of Real Life

Sunita Sachdeva

Ashwini Ahuja’s new collection of short stories “Artist in confusion” by

Sanbun Publishers, Delhi is a significant contribution to the genre of short
story. As almost all twenties stories of the collection revolve around the
theme of relationship as Ashwini himself proclaims. After writing three books
in Hindi, Ashwini Ahuja revolutionizes the trail of his writing journey with an
English fiction; apart from his Hindi fiction which reflects the true images of
real life as well as some blue elements make the book more spicy,
entertaining and enjoyable to read. His style of the writing is as vivid and
colourful as the readers see in his Hindi fiction. It might not be hazardous to
say that his work mainly focuses on mediocrity of the society where
exploitation and triviality is all prevalent.

Ashwini Ahuja born in semi urban township Fazilka and brought up the same
small city has emerged him as one of the different writer for different strata
of society listening to the saga of agonies of low profile semi urban people
and their tantalizing relationships within the families and societies exhibiting
the culture of small cities which is quite dissimilar from metros. With this
book, none can deny Ashwini reinvented himself as a master storyteller and
one of the most compelling literary voices in the recent times; who can
create a picture gallery of plethora of characters probing their inner realms.

The opening story, Artist in Confusion, helps one delve into the psyche of
Anugya and her bank official husband Niket who too with his wife separately
experiences the trauma of the sudden, unexpected death of his prodigy,
computer savvy and versatile school going son Lakshya and he inexplicitly
repents on his folly for not calling his wife Anugya despite noticing the
deteriorating health of their son when Anugya was toured to Jaipur with
school kids. The skirmishes and tension between Anugya and Niket and
sometime later when Anugya gets pregnant again, the pressure between the
couple logically reduces. Niket looks after her spouse but pretends he is not
interested in her shows the mindset of Indian families where families moral
values rule.

In another story ‘Nightmarish Note’ protagonist Sushma’s obsession in

making relationship with Australian guy as well as the utilization of her prize
money which she has received in lieu of participating in Krishan Janam
Asthmi celebration finally ends her into frustration and disillusionment due to
her follies. Through Sushma’s character, the writer shows our youth brigade
of 21st century is madly hankering after the foreigners to make contacts with
them. The glorifications of the foreigners with the only reason they live on
that land where dollars are earned show the slavish mentality of the Indians.

‘I’m Sorry Sister’ exhibits the callous behaviour of a lady of the street who
claims to be the boss of the all street families only because she had come to
live the street first of all from other dwellers. Due to her ruthless behaviour
and magpie attitude, nobody likes Mrs. Kulkarni in the street; even the maid
servant Rani Di too refuses to work at their home. Finally, skinflint Mrs.
Kulkarni employs another servant a young boy in spite of a maid servant.
After a period, boy servant attempts to harass the girls in the family when
Kulkarni couple is outing for a morning walk. Prof. MS Verma has rightly said
the mercenary mentality and hypocrisy is observed in Ashwini Ahuja’s story
collection.

In another story ‘Mystery of a Girl’ Suneer, the protagonist and the fancied
lover of the locality girl Naina has his share of broken dreams as he misses
Naina, her dream girls for whom, he manages money for buying a mobile set
and jewellery for her but finally the mysterious girls rejects him by
announcing her whims he is characterless, not caring, It hurts Suneer but
there is no way all around. A candid message the story delivers is, where
there is bargaining and cheating in love, there is no passion for love. By
being dishonest in love, you might attain nothing but for disillusionment, pain
and distress.

‘A Woman Dies with Locker Key’ shows the apathetic attitude of young sons
who deliberately didn’t look after their mother and when the mother dies, in
spite of shoulder the corpse; they indulge themselves into hunting out the
property documents the mother has left behind with their death. Another
story “Shower Showering” shows the fancies of husband who wishes to
shower-enjoy with spouse ignoring the fact that in the presence of growing
daughter, it might be fatal for them.

The thematic story ‘Leprosy’ is a love story of matured couple where mission
to eradicate the scourge of leprosy is more dominating than the emotions of
love. The story takes a new twist when the lady protagonist lies to her
boyfriend that she has married to an American Sir Anderson just to keep him
busy in social work for leprosy outcasts and pretend to forget him and finally
she succeeds in her mission when she watched on a TV channel the news of
his boyfriend’s achievements and it was that the USA government picked him
for prestigious Magsaysay Award.

In ‘Sorry Sir’ the readers enjoy the follies of a slapdash college teacher who
himself becomes the victim to his own misdeeds and sloppy habits. ‘Baby
Doll’ expounds the pains of small children whose freedom is detained down to
the overburden of the study and the parents’ ambitions for the children to
earn higher grades. Moreover, in Indian middle class society, jealousy
between mother in law and daughter in law is commonly prevalent; the
writer through the story ‘My wife is Beautiful’ shows the extremity of love for
a husband and hatred for mother in law which is only possible in Indian
society.

‘The Guru’ exposes the character of a teacher who pretends to be the guru
but exploits a thirteen year old student. ‘Betrayal’ gives the readers a feeling
of pain and agonies when they picture a childhood chum deceiving poor
barber Bhagwan Dass by playing havoc with the life of his daughter. In the
story ‘Beautiful Mind’ a spinster values more the limousine guy than the
would-be-grooms her high profile father meets her. It is not exaggeration to
proclaim that Ashwini’s stories give the presentation of throbbing and living
sensation of life interwoven with reality. His stories are written with
absorbing intelligence, passion and sympathy which represent the trials and
frustrations of the human life. The force and strength of his narration lies not
only in the poignancy and reality but the dexterity as well with which the
writer relates the tales. Ashwini certainly has some promise for his readers.
Its’ ironic humour and varied narrative techniques make the ARTIST IN
CONFUSION a good read. It is indeed a valued fiction.